


i think i've broken something

by escapismandsharpobjects



Category: Young Wallander (TV)
Genre: Broken Bones, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Whump, Whumptober 2020, call this pre-relationship i guess?, set nebulously in episode 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-13
Updated: 2020-10-13
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:48:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26980897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/escapismandsharpobjects/pseuds/escapismandsharpobjects
Summary: whumptober day 12 - prompt: broken bones. sometime during/around episode 3 (don't think too hard about when exactly) kurt gets beaten up yet again, and yet again he goes to mona for help.
Relationships: Kurt Wallander & Mona
Comments: 6
Kudos: 13
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	i think i've broken something

**Author's Note:**

> hi what's up!!! i just checked and there is. one other fic for this fandom so. hi. hello to the tiny young wallander fandom. anyway i have only seen the first three episodes of the show so far so i am very very sorry if anything feels off or ooc!!! like i said in the summary idk when this fits into the show but call it some point in the third episode but like. don't think about it. time does not matter.

A fist collided with the side of Kurt’s face.  _ I can’t believe I’m getting beaten up again, _ he thought, dismally, as he struggled to protect his still-healing stab wound to the best of his ability - in lieu of protecting, say, his face  _ (also _ still healing from the last time he’d been beaten up, but far less serious in the grand scheme of his injuries). 

A sharp punch to the corner of his jaw sent his head snapping to the side, and then there was another punch aimed at his stomach, which he turned into with his right side. The last punch was by far the worst - a hard, fast, and extremely painful fist to his chest (which he also turned into with his right side). The second the punch connected, he felt something snap, and thought he could almost hear a cracking noise. 

That was his last coherent thought before the pain took over, and then he was collapsing as the full force of the hit took effect, too overcome by it to even cry out. He watched his attacker jog away through a haze of pain and tears, and then focused on himself.

He wasn’t unconscious, which was a step up from his last beating. He also didn’t feel any blood leaking from anywhere on his body, which was very good. There was, however, the minor problem of his not being able to breathe.

Well, he  _ could  _ breathe. But the second he tried to take a deep breath, in an attempt to steady himself and ride out the pain, the exact opposite of what he’d wanted happened - a sharp, hot pain shot through his chest, centered, he realized, with a terrible certainty, over his right rib cage. He panicked for a second - he wanted, more than anything, to take a deep breath and calm himself down, but doing that would only cause more pain, and certainly would not calm him down. 

So instead, he made a soft noise of pain and brought a hand up to his ribs, intending to do what, exactly, he couldn’t say. Hold them still, maybe. But the second his hand made contact with his side, he was hissing and pulling it away. That  _ hurt. _ Not as badly as trying to take a deep breath had, but still. He had to fight against his natural instinct to curl over in pain, sensing that that, too, would be a bad idea.

Deciding that there was really nothing else for it, unless he went to the hospital, Kurt started to walk. He took slow, ginger steps at first, trying to minimize the pain, but he realized pretty quickly that there was little point - it hurt  _ anyway, _ and it would hurt for longer if he kept up his current pace. 

He exited the alley that this had all taken place in and looked around for a cab. Fortunately, he saw one approaching, and he reached out an arm and shouted for it to stop. He regretted that decision the moment he made it. His vision darkened around the edges, his entire torso pulsed with that now-familiar white-hot pain, and he fought against himself to avoid passing out. 

By some miracle, the cab driver had seen him in the brief second for which he’d stuck out his arm, and Kurt slid into the cab’s backseat, trying not to make too much noise that would indicate the level of pain he was in. He was really  _ not  _ in the mood for a chat.

Luckily, the cabbie sensed this, and remained silent through the drive to the temporary refugee shelter. Kurt had given him the address without really thinking of anything else - Mona would be able to help him. She had already helped him, and, plus, Kurt was confident that she wouldn’t try to force him to the hospital. He  _ couldn’t  _ go to the hospital. He couldn’t be kicked off of this case, not now, after everything. He trusted that she would understand this.

\--

“We need to stop meeting like this,” was the first thing Mona said to him when he walked up to her, limping slightly in an effort to avoid jostling his ribs, making pained faces whenever a step was particularly difficult.

“Sorry,” was all Kurt could think to offer.

“What happened?”

He explained, briefly, watching her make a face. “You should really-”

“Go to the hospital, I know.”

“But…”

“I can’t. I can’t be off this case. Not now.”

Mona nodded, and motioned for him to sit down on the edge of a table. “Broken ribs, yes?”

He nodded, groaning in pain when she gently prodded at his side. “Sorry,” she said, continuing to prod. “How much does it hurt?”

“A lot,” he confessed, feeling that there wasn’t much use in pretending otherwise. 

She removed her hands, looking at him sympathetically. “There’s really not much I can do,” she explained, and Kurt had been hoping she wouldn’t say that.

“There must be  _ something,” _ he said. Anything to make it stop hurting, just for a bit. Too much of his world was  _ pain  _ right now.

Mona shook her head. “I’m sorry, but the only thing you can do is let them heal on their own. Even a hospital can’t do much more.” She paused, waiting for him to understand what she was saying. “I can give you some painkillers, but they won’t stop the pain completely.”

“That’s okay,” Kurt said. Anything was better than nothing, and besides, he was pretty sure that there wasn’t anything in the world that could have stopped his pain completely.

Mona nodded, walking off for a second to find the pills. Kurt, suddenly alone and with nothing to distract him, felt the pain even more acutely, felt it constrict his chest with every breath, no matter how shallow.

Mona returned to him as he was nearly hyperventilating, trying his best to avoid moving his chest at all. She quickly put down the bottle she’d been carrying and placed a gentle hand on his back, careful not to disturb any of his numerous injuries. “Take a deep breath,” she instructed, and Kurt shook his head.

“It hurts...when I do that,” he replied, forcing the words out between his far-too-shallow breaths.

“Otherwise you are going to hyperventilate and pass out, and then I will have no choice but to take you to the hospital,” she warned.

That got through to Kurt, who forced himself to take a deep breath, feeling tears well in his eyes as his chest yet again constricted with a sharp pain. 

“That’s it, keep breathing,” Mona said, picking the bottle back up. “In a moment you can have some of these. They’ll help,” she promised, unsure of how much they really would.

When his breathing had finally, painfully, evened out, Kurt stuck out his hand for the pills, which Mona handed to him, along with a bottle of water. He swallowed them, fighting the urge to cough on the water, and waited for the pain of those actions to die down slightly before he spoke.

“Thanks,” he said, and very slowly pushed himself off of the table to leave. “I owe you one.”

“Actually, I think you’ll find you owe me three.”

**Author's Note:**

> thanks a billion for reading!!!! not that i particularly think anyone will but oh well :) i enjoyed writing this and i am loving the show, so i hope you enjoyed reading it!!! please let me know what you think!


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